Smuggling is in the news to-day says the "Sunday Express." An intensified watch is being kept on the owners of fashionable dress and millinery salons, Customs men have walked into a number of London shops in recent months.
Showing their cards of authority, they have demanded to see the firm's books and all evidence of purchases and transactions. These are compared with declarations made at the ports.
Many women—often very wealthy—think it clever to evade duty. They go to Paris and pay high prices for jewellery and trinkets. Yet they will resort to every device to deceive the man at the Customs barrier. Men do not make good smugglers. They usually curl up under questioning. But women! Customs officers say they are much cleverer liars, The Customs man's greatest asset is his instinct a mysterious quality which they all possess. It enables them to pick out a smuggler at a glance from among a score of innocent travellers.
The" way in which a case or a garment is carried often gives the smuggler away. For instance, a traveller from South Africa came ashore grasping a bag of golf clubs. Instead of leaning them nonchalantly against the Customs tables, he hung on to them grimly. That gave him away.
The officer pulled out a club, found to his surprise that all the clubs had been sawn in half. The lower part of the golf bag held gold watches. The duty amounted to more than £100.
Another traveller was sorry he denied having whiskey in a flask in his pocket. He swore it.was only tea.
The Customs men were suspicious and searched! his baggage. They found several bottles! Had the man admitted the contents of his flask he might have escaped, because the amount was not dutiable.
Traffic in "Dope"
More drugs are getting into this country.
Such articles are often landed by air. They are wrapped in oilskin, with corks attached to keep them floating in case they fall into water. "The coastguard man may be far away at the time. He has about ten miles to patrol.
Wholesale smuggling of wines and spirits and tobacco goes on along the south coast, at places such as the Isle of Wight and Romney Marshes, and at fishing ports such as Grimsby and Hull.
The smugglers drive round to inns and other places offering brandy and rum at ridiculously low prices—as cheap as five shillings a bottle for the best you can buy. Country houses have been used as distributing centres.
From Marseilles is shipped excellent champagne, from Antwerp comes a lot of tobacco. This is sometimes carried in small craft apparently destined for other Continental pari The authorities bond and seal Once at sea, the ships divert their course for England, the seals are broken, and the craft steal up some quiet creek, where lorries are waiting.
Tobacco smuggling has its dangers because of the pungent smell of the pure Virginia leaf. Yet probably ten tons a month comes into Britain, and that represents a loss in duty of nearly £8,000.
Weird are the hiding-places found for little articles such as jewels. "They have been concealed in bars of soap, in umbrella handles, in boxes of face powder, in the collars of pet dogs and monkeys, inside stuffed birds and animals and st. tuettes, A valuable jewel can be fastened to a dress so that it looks like a cheap ornament. The steward of a British liner used to bring bot-ties of champagne ashore in empty milk chums, Those sharp-eyed men at the Eu: toms barriers have their counterpart in the rummage officers who board 21] incoming ships to examine their cargoes. They ave adept at selecting particular consignments for scrutiny. Of course, they ave often acting on "information received."
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.